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Non fiction

A VIOLENCIA EXCEDENTE

By FRANCISCO SAMPEDRO

About this book

A violencia excedente is the result of a talk given by the author at the University of Bologna at a conference on peace, where he not only analysed the phenomenon of violence but also analysed all the disproportionate and irrational aggression that the authors describes with the expressive metaphor of “exceeding violence”. The book is written with all analytical rigour and is mainly a political book that can be included under the heading of “combat literature” in its own right.

Book fragment

If we try to diminish the expressions of violence, if we want to move towards peace, even if it is in a regulatory framework, as an idea of reason –in the Kantian sense- we must not only tackle the reasons behind conflicts, which are material goods, but also try to impose some measures to repress and reject the excess of pure violence. For all this, first of all, we must understand that any attempt to create institutions based on a wrong perception of human society will most likely be a failure. In spite of the improvement of the legal system, there are still crude realities, such as class privileges, embezzlement, corruption, biases, etc. Let us just say one thing about the State. We are still living in times when the State is presented as a machine that transforms violence into legal power and rights to exercise power based on violence. The State is a machine of violence in the same way as we can refer to –as Althusser remarks- “a steam machine or petrol engine (…)”